


NightCaps in the Crypt

by DestinyFreeReally



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-27
Updated: 2016-09-27
Packaged: 2018-08-17 13:15:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8145413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestinyFreeReally/pseuds/DestinyFreeReally
Summary: spuffy drinking and lite angsting





	

     "Aah, not that one, luv. Leave the hard stuff to the grown ups." Spike caught her hand with a glass bottle half way to her lips. Felt the warmth in them, the warmth the booze probably heightened. He could see her, slightly tipsy, less inhibited. More Buffy, less Slayer. She didn't hide the pain in her eyes from him anymore. It was refreshing to him, confusing as hell, but he couldn't stop himself from looking at it. Like a car crash he kept finding himself caught up in. The hard stuff wouldn't make that pain go away, he knew from experience. It'd just make her pretty little head hurt, too.   
  
     "The _granpas_ , you mean. I wanna try this one it smells....funky." Buffy felt the tiny, blonde hairs in her nose tingle in half-anticipation, half-dread as she held the bottle up to her face. But the big, stupid vampire couldn't know everything. And she hardly ever drank. Hardly ever had any fun. And that was before she died, too. Pffft. Tossing her blonde head back, hot liquid scorching down her throat, her voice come sputtering back to her stinging lips. "See?" She croaked. "I'm..I'm fine...all...growed-up-Buffy and stuff." She couldn't keep her tongue from pointing out at him, still tingly from the booze.  
  
     "Yes, yes, very impressive, luv. A good show from the Slayer, yeah?" He watched her nod vigorously, biting back his own smile knowing her throat was probably still on fire. "Want something a little cooler, pet? I'm gonna haveta be slowing down, soon, dawn and all."   
  
    "Dawn! Oh god, I'm awful, I completely...I..what am I even doing here, I-" Her face went red, defeated, her shoulders slightly more slumped.   
  
    "Not Dawn, luv, she's gone to stay with Tinkerbell the good witch tonight, and crossed her heart she'd scamper to class on time. I just meant dawn...not looking to miss a good day's sleep when I'm proper drunk." One black fingernail pointed to the sky, Buffy looked up, only to be reminded they were in the crypt, where she could not in fact, see the sky.   
  
    "Hiding a vamp watch someplace? How do you know it's day?" Buffy made a mental note to giggle later at the mental image of Spike with a novelty Dracula wristwatch. Unlikely, but entertaining all the same. Especially to tipsy, growed-up-Buffy.   
  
     "Have a bit of an intimate relationship with the sun, pet. Can smell it coming soon. Want a drop of coke to cool you down? Not cold, of course. Crypt living isn't too conducive to modern luxuries like excess refrigeration, but it'll help with the burn, if you'd like." Sometimes he liked the burn. Drinking for the taste was one thing, but he hadn't done that in decades. Drank to sleep, drank to remember, to forget, drank to get drunk and then drank to remember why he wanted to be sober. He marveled at her. He'd drank to forget her, too, and that hadn't worked at all. She always came back to him, like dawn.   
  
      She took the warm can of Coke he'd offered her and big gulps later her voice felt stronger again, she could barely taste the fire it felt like she swallowed.  
  
     "What does dawn smell like then?" She was so disturbingly pleasant like this, unguarded and curious and less-Slayer-more-girl Buffy. He reminded himself that this wasn't all she was. This wasn't all he loved. But it was something to see her like this. It reminded him that she was a girl, and had all the bollocksed-up essence of a girl very much confused, by her life and her relationships and place in the world. Sad, and lonely, and seeking him, he could love her easily, he figured.  That was the problem. One of the problems.  
  
    Spike took the empty can from her, collected the empty bottles they'd sampled and took them to the edge of the crypt. Returning, he found Buffy, shoeless and curled up into his television-watching chair, eased into a heavy sleep, if her heartbeat was any indication. Far from sunlight, he took off his shirt and wondered for the first time in awhile what it felt like to be dust. She'd be gone when he woke up, he'd swear his ashes on it. But he laid his duster over her, watched her pull it to her chin and figured this would be the kind of night William would've written a poem about. Bloody wanker.


End file.
